


so hear my voice, remind you not to bleed

by wrtchedwolf



Series: as long as you love me (steve + bucky) [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Returns, Christmas, Codependency, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Headcanon, Holidays, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-09-01 09:32:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16762495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wrtchedwolf/pseuds/wrtchedwolf
Summary: The truth is this: It’s been ten months since Bucky was released from the soul stone; ten months since Steve woke up in the hospital to find himself alone, and Bucky in the wind.





	so hear my voice, remind you not to bleed

He steps out onto the roof of the Avengers complex, only a thin, white cotton shirt and grey sweatpants to shield him from the cold. Not even his feet were covered, bare and exposed to the air like all other parts of him, internal and external.

Steve's throat is raw. When he swallows, it's a sharp stab of pain like it's another knife to his gut and not a byproduct of his screaming. He stops when he reaches the edge of the building, carelessly maneuvering his body until he's half-dangling off the side. Cold air rushes up to greet the pads of his feet, but he doesn't feel it.

The nights have not been kind to him as of late. He can't bear the darkness and what it holds, but if he turns on a light he has to face what he's done. Who he's become. The things he's lost.

He's not ready to deal with any of it. At least here, exposed to the world, there's some semblance of light without being overbearing. The wind beats at him, but it can't defeat the sheer power of his body, though it feels as if it's about to wilt at any moment. He's not small anymore, no longer frail and unable to put up a fight. Eventually, it gives up, dulling to a slow breeze that no longer musses up his hair that's grown past his ears again.

Steve curls his fingers into fists, clenching them tight against his thighs as he fights off memories and thoughts he so desperately doesn't wanna deal with tonight. They'll catch up with him, though, like they always do. If nothing else, pain is persistent. It won't stop until it devours you, or you fight until it's gone.

He's chosen the easier path; the path of less resistance.

That's all Steve's life has ever been. Resist, resist, resist. Fight, conquer, fight again. From womb to fucking tomb, it seems. He can't remember a war he's fought that he's won—not in any way that matters, at least.

He's stopped resisting now, let the dark crawl over his body and hover like a lover, before diving in and devouring him. Even when there's nothing left, the pain keeps finding ways to devour more, more, _more_.

If someone were to peel the skin off his body, it would go willingly and leave behind nothing but bones. The rest of him has been hollowed out, feeding the beast that lives within. The beast is his only friend, now, after everything else has left, has _abandoned_ him.

In the far distance, where no normal human ears can reach, carolers sing in the streets. Right now, they chorus to "'O Come All Ye Faithful," and Steve's compelled to hum along for a few moments.

He does, until it stings, and the memories become too much. _Not tonight. Not tonight._

It's Christmas, after all.

The truth is this: Ten months ago, Steve, Tony, and whoever else was left from the battle with Thanos and his army figured out a way to reclaim their loved ones from the soul stone. Shortly after, it was game-over for Thanos. Dr. Strange had not failed them, as they began to believe he did. The cost was high, but they did what had to be done, to save half a universe of innocents.

Steve can't remember how they did it anymore, despite his nearly perfect memory. Sometimes it still feels like he's on that battlefield, wheezing and bleeding out and ready to die, blinking through the dirt in his eyes and gritting his teeth against the agonizing feeling of his organs attempting to fall out of his body.

_"This isn't a time to die on me, pal, please I ca–I can't—"_

_Pain, flooding his body, blurring his vision. Through the haze, he feels cold fingertips at the pulse point on his throat._

_"Steve. Stevie, c'mon, please. Stay awake for me, yeah? Help's on its way, I promise."_

_He knows that voice, remembers it like it's his own. It's Bucky, it has to be, but Bucky's gone, Bucky—_

_"I won't let you die here. Not again, Stevie, not again."_

He clenches his eyes next, forcing down the ghost sensations against his stomach, leaning over him. At the memory, he has to choke back a sob, cover his mouth with trembling fingers he hadn't known were shaking.

The truth is this: It's been ten months since Bucky was released from the soul stone; ten months since Steve woke up in the hospital to find himself alone, and Bucky in the wind.

He thought he'd been hallucinating as a side effect of nearly dying. If Bucky wasn't there with him, there was only one possible answer—he hadn't come back. They must've failed, or-or they weren't able to save everyone, or they hadn't _done_ it yet. But when he recovered enough to ask about it, nobody called him out. Nobody told him it was a hallucination. Sam was there, and Wanda, and—and everyone they'd lost had returned. 

What they _did_ tell him was that Bucky had saved his life, and without him, Steve would've been long buried six feet under. Except that he disappeared, and nobody to this day knows why.

It shouldn't hurt this bad anymore, losing him. Steve's so used to losing Bucky that it's become second nature, the way his mind and body shuts down to let his heart bleed when there's nothing else to do but grieve. 

There have been no other threats to keep him busy, so he's been here, living in the Avengers complex. He's alone, most of the time. Seems like the Avengers have disbanded for the moment, everybody going their separate ways for a while to pick up the pieces Thanos left behind.

It does, though. It hurts so fucking _bad_.

He inhales sharply, forces himself to ease his breathing through his heart slamming against his rib cage as if his emotional pain has manifested into a physical reality. He can't be—it can't be—

but it is. He'd know the feeling through a million miles, a million years, a million _lifetimes_ —

It's Christmas. The world is silent, but he's not alone.

A warm body sits in the empty space next to him, just out of reach, looking out at the world that had so many times rejected and honored and loved and loathed him. 

Anywhere but him, Steve supposes. Anywhere but the man he left behind again, this time willingly.

Steve shouldn't blame him. He does, anyway. Selfishly, it makes him feel a little better, despite the fact that he still blames himself, too. However, it's not his fault that he woke up in a hospital room alone because it was his best friend's choice to run away. Bucky's choices aren't his fault.

That's what Sam told him, at least. It's the only thing he's managed to listen to, after having it drilled into his head every day for several weeks. So yeah, not all of it is his fault. It's a small relief, to know that and also believe it.

Steve doesn't want to talk first, terrified that it will shatter this careful moment shared between two old friends. He craves to reach out, tuck his face into the divot between Bucky's neck and shoulder he used to be too short to reach, to steady himself. 

_It's not like that anymore,_ he reminds himself with a sharp pang of hurt, slowly tucking his fingers back into tight fists they'd relaxed out of. Safety has always come easy with Bucky, but he's not safe anymore. He can't be, refuses to _let_ himself be.

He's saved from the pressure when Bucky speaks first, minutes later.

"I saw you. A lot. In the stone."

Steve dares another glance at him. He wears a thick tawny sweater that covers his hands, with jeans and shoes that match the night. He looks clean, as if he's been showering regularly and taking care of himself. 

That's good, that means he's doing well. That's all he can ask for.

The shadows that live in his eyes are a different story. 

Steve ignores them. He doesn't know whether it's his place or not to offer him any semblance of comfort. Maybe if they were who they used to be, Bucky'd have scooped him into his thick arms, took him back inside, and curled around him in bed, tracing a cold hand over soft skin until they both fell asleep. He hasn't done that. 

Neither of them is who they used to be. Steve's a shell of a man, and Bucky—he couldn't begin to say what kind of man Bucky is now.

Ten months is a long time when you've been mourning someone for two years, finally get them back, and lose them again. Ten months is a long time to wallow and feel sorry for yourself because it's your fault, mostly. If it's changed _him_ so drastically, he can't tell what it's done to Bucky. Maybe things are better. He hopes things are better. He deserves that.

"What did you see?" He forces himself to ask, though he doesn't want to. It's too personal, too loud in the openness of the night.

At any moment, the wind could pick up and carry his words to the ears of someone who will use it to manipulate them, hurt them. It's paranoid, but he still lowers his voice. Better safe than sorry. Better quiet than dead.

"It was. Different," he replies, furrowing his brows and tilting his head toward Steve, though he continues looking everywhere _but_ him. "All those times I saved you from fights back in Brooklyn. I'd stand back and watch. You—you don't make it out of Azzano. The helicarrier, over and over. I'd finish it. Each time. Wouldn't matter what you said. Wouldn't matter if I knew you or not."

Steve flinches. His voice is cold, hard, but the memory burns him as he recoils.

_"You're my friend."_

_"And you're my mission."_

_"Then finish it."_

And the words they'd always say to each other, no matter where they were, no matter when, no matter _what._ Words that had gotten him through days he'd been so sick they'd all believed he was dying, and he was, for a while. Words that had gotten him through battles back in the war. Words that had gotten him through his search for Bucky after the fall of SHIELD and Hydra, the months he spent in cryosleep in Wakanda, repairing.

_"I'm with you 'til the end of the line."_

Those words give him no comfort now, no warmth. It fills him with a deeper cold than this earth could ever instill in him, causing all the raw parts of him to freeze over and bite into him.

"Does it matter now?" He asks, voice bitter.

"Of course it matters."

A humorless laugh bursts through the air, nearly startling himself. "It matters? You're seriously telling me it _matters?_ It doesn't mean shit Bucky, and you know it."

There it is—that fire that heats his bones, fueling his anger and tucking away the hurt. Anger has always come so easy for him, much more so than grief has. He knows anger, he's never known how to handle grief.

Bucky is quiet. It only serves to stoke his building fire.

"You don't know me, Steve."

Steve's head whips towards him, outraged. "The _hell_ I don't know you. You don't think I've spent over half my damn life following you, learning every possible thing I could about the only guy who's ever had my back? You don't think I've made an effort to try and relearn you, _all_ of you, after what Hydra did to you? Because if so, I don't think you really know me, Buck. I tried. I'm _still trying._ "

He's not looking at him. He's _still_ not looking at him.

"Look at me," he nearly begs, desperate and aching for something, _anything_ that Bucky will give him other than this ice, treating him as if he's disgusted by him. Perhaps he is. "Goddamnit, James, _look at me_."

Bucky does. The moment he turns his head to look at him, Steve's face falls, and he feels like such a fucking _hypocrite_ because he can't do it. He can't look into those eyes that hold such sorrow, such _pain_ that calls to him, howls in the emptiness in his chest Bucky had once filled before he'd abandoned him. 

There are tears streaming down his face, lip wobbling once, twice, before stilling.

As quickly as it came, the anger dissipates. He tries to reach for it, bring it back to him, but the fire has turned to embers, and then to ash, not leaving a single coal that could spark another fire. All the fight has left him, looking at his best friend who looks so _broken,_ and can't help but feel like he's the one who caused it.

_It's not your fault. It's not your fault, none of this is your fault, it's not it's not it_ _'s—_

"You don't know what it's like," Bucky's voice shakes. "To watch people hurt you and not being able to step in and stop it, only to have it change before my eyes and it's _me_ who's hurting you, over and over like a—like a fucking _broken record_. And I couldn't stop it. 

"Every time

I drove my fist into your face, every time I sunk a knife in your heart or shot you through the head, I _felt it_ , and I watched you die. When I begged for it to stop—when I was on my hands and knees _sobbing_ for you, crawling over your dead body and praying you'd wake up and it would be over, it wasn't. It never ended. Every time I thought it was finally over, that someone was coming to save me, I woke up in an alley in Brooklyn all over again."

Whatever Steve could've possibly had to say next dissolved on his tongue as he let out a strangled sob, hands aching to reach out and touch him, to comfort him as he's falling apart at the seams right in front of him. Bucky had been in the stone for months, _months_ , reliving the same nightmare on repeat until all he'd known was Steve's death.

All he could taste was blood, subconsciously biting down on the inside of his cheek so hard it tore open. He never thought about it, what it was like in the stone—and, _fuck_ , if that wasn't the most selfish thing Steve's ever done. Not for one second did he think of what it felt like for _Bucky_ , too stuck in his own grief of losing his best friend all over again. 

Bucky flinches and tears his eyes away, crying softly. He wipes his stuffy nose against the sleeve of his sweater, dampening it with his tears along the way. He'd been alone all this time, dealing with his experience in the stone all by himself without anyone to help him through it, comfort him, reassure him that it wasn't real. Steve's _alive_ , after all.

"I'm right here, Buck," Steve croaks hopelessly, inching his hand close but not touching, both asking for permission and letting Bucky know he's here. "Why'd you—why'd you run? I've been here this whole time."

His voice is too quiet, too vulnerable. He's laying all of himself down for Bucky to see like he always has, who shakes his head at Steve, a sad, bitter smile plastered upon his face.

"When I came back, I thought it was still a nightmare. Same thing, just a different place."

_"I won't let you die here. Not again, Stevie, not again."_

"I'm sorry," is all he knows how to say, staring at Bucky as if _he's_ the one who had to endure it, as if he's going to somehow take it all away by simply holding him in his arms. The world is more complicated than that, and Bucky's always been more complicated than anyone else. 

"You're not a fix-it Steve," he replies thickly, staring down at the ground hidden in the night.

"I know."

"It's not gonna all go away just because I'm here now."

"Are you?" He can't help but ask. "Here now?"

"I don't know." His words are unsure, hesitant. "Dunno if you want me to stay or not."

"Why wouldn't I?" The reaction is instant. Confusion is plain as day on his face because of _course_ he'd want Bucky to stay. How could he ever think otherwise? To assume so is ridiculous. He'd sacrificed half of his team and the relationship he'd built with them _for_ Bucky, shattered Captain America's perfect image, tore the _world_ down looking for him, so he could bring him home.

Steve can't deny that he's hurt and Bucky is at the root of it, holding his bleeding heart in his metal fist and waiting to tear it out for good. It doesn't matter how much Bucky hurts him, or if he disappears and suddenly reappears in his life again as if he'd never left at all—he loves Bucky with the entirety of his soul. He'll follow him like the day follows the night: forever, entwined as one bleeds into the other, never knowing when one truly starts and where the other truly ends. Maybe— _maybe—_ neither of them truly end at all; always there, within one another, present but unseen.

He can't make out the details of Bucky's face turned away from him in the dark like this. If he's still crying, it's silent tears and still shoulders like the soldier he was conditioned to be. The only thing that gives him away as anything other than cold is his equally vulnerable voice as he says, "I can't keep leaving and coming back forever."

"So stay," Steve amends, and finally, his hand moves to brush against Bucky's knee. When he doesn't move or flinch, he rests it there, cool hand seeking the warmth that still seeps from the skin underneath his jeans. "You don't gotta keep leaving."

Bucky's breathing stutters as he exhales, looking back at Steve with a force that nearly knocks him over the edge of the building. "It doesn't matter, Steve. Don't you get that? Wherever we take this, wherever it goes, it'll end again somehow. The nightmares a-and the— _you—_ I had to leave. I can't keep coming back like I'm lost I'm _not_ , I just—I just—"

"Need me?" He finishes for him, staring back at him with such intensity. "Ever thought I need you, too? That I _miss_ you?"

He's not sure if Bucky's huff is supposed to be a chuckle or another cry as another tear slips down his face and he presses forward, too quick for Steve to do anything, and wraps him in his arms. Steve chokes on nothing, too stunned to do anything but sit there for a few moments. When Bucky starts to pull back, hesitant, he snaps out of it, circling his arms around his best friend and pulling him as close as possible.

Surprisingly, it's Bucky who tucks his face into Steve's neck, whispering "I don't wanna need you" against his skin. It sends a shiver up Steve's spine.

"I know," he whispers back, pressing his nose into Bucky's hair. He smells like pine, like Christmas and—it's Christmas.

It's _Christmas_ , and this is just about the best present he's ever gotten. Silently, he sends a short thanks to Saint Nick, who yes, of course, he knows is not _real_ , but it feels appropriate. 

Bucky doesn't wanna need him, just like he doesn't wanna need Bucky. He understands. The both of them have been through so much, together and separate. To depend on one another like this, to love each other as much as they do, is a curse more than anything. They're cursed to circle around each other, meeting in the middle for only a few moments until a song pushes them away to dance around again, always just out of reach.

He knows Bucky isn't going to stay forever. Eventually, something will happen and the dance will start all over again, but for now they have this. They have each other.

Steve closes his eyes and breathes him in, slowly humming the tune of "Silent Night" along with the carolers. He's not sure if Bucky's hearing stretches long enough to hear it, but he starts to hum, too.

"Merry Christmas, Buck," he says a while later, long after the song ends. 

"Merry Christmas, Stevie," he replies, tucking himself further into Steve's body. "M'sorry I didn't get you a present. It was a last minute kinda decision."

"A last minute decision to travel all the way to upstate New York to see me?"

At that, Bucky pulls away but doesn't leave Steve's grip, a timid, embarrassed looking smile spreading across his face. "Well, technically I've already been here."

"You—you're telling me you've been watching me this entire time!?"

"Not the _entire_ time," he retorts with a roll of his eyes. "But for the past month or so, yeah. Thought there'd be someone watching your back out here, but 'parently _not_ , so I'm the one stuck with it."

Steve shakes his head in mock disappointment, but there's a smile on his face, too. "What am I gonna do with you?"

"I'm _hoping_ you'll bring me back inside and take me to bed, but maybe that's wishful thinking," Bucky says lightly, but there's doubt hidden in his tone, shadows ever present in his eyes.

So Steve says, "of course I will," and picks him up with ease, walking barefoot to the roof entrance door with as much gusto as he can muster up. And if it hurts his back—because he's not _invincible,_ and a super soldier paired with a metal arm is heavier than he thought he'd be—he makes sure to show no sign of it.

The emptiness in his rib cage howls, reminding him that their talk isn't over. The hurt Bucky caused him is still there, lurking just underneath the surface, but dawn is on its way and the sun will shine again.

They'll get through this, they always do. After all, it's _Christmas_ , and it'll be the first they've spent together in almost eighty years, just Steve and Bucky.

When they get to bed, Bucky pulls off his clothes with ease, pulling Steve flush up against his body and whispering sweet nothings against bare skin, just like Steve wished for. 


End file.
